interchangeable

English

Etymology

From interchange +‎ -able.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ɪntɚˈt͡ʃeɪnd͡ʒəbl̩/, [ɪɾ̃ɚˈt͡ʃeɪnd͡ʒəbl̩]

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

Adjective

interchangeable (not comparable)

1. Freely substitutable; that may be swapped at will.

   Synonym: equivalent

   Eli Whitney's development of interchangeable parts was a breakthrough for modern manufacturing. Prior to that, each part had to be made custom.

   • 1958 April, “Diesel Railbus for British Railways”, in Railway Magazine, page 275:

     Constructional features of the railbus include the use of rubber suspension for axlebox/underframe and underframe/body mountings, the use of B.U.T. power transmission equipment, many components of which are interchangeable with those on British Railways standard railcars, power-operated sliding doors, and an absence of normal sidebuffers or drawgear.

   • 1997, George Carlin, Brain Droppings‎, New York: Hyperion Books, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, →OL, page 104:

     Sometimes the same words mean opposite things. Sometimes the opposite is true. Shock absorbers are called shocks. Slow down and slow up are interchangeable.

   • 2014 September 16, Ian Jack, “Is this the end of Britishness”, in The Guardian:

     The English, until relatively recently, seem to have imagined “English” and “British” to be interchangeable, as if Britain was just a bigger England.

2. Following each other in alternate succession; alternating.

Derived terms

• interchangeability
• interchangeableness
• interchangeably
• noninterchangeable
• uninterchangeable

Translations

freely substitutable

Bulgarian: взаимозаменяем (vzaimozamenjaem) Catalan: intercanviable Dutch: uitwisselbaar (nl) Finnish: keskenään vaihtokelpoinen, vaihtovuoroinen French: interchangeable (fr) Galician: intercambiable (gl) German: austauschbar (de), auswechselbar Greek: εναλλάξιμος (el) (enalláximos) Hungarian: felcserélhető (hu), egymással felcserélhető (hu) Italian: intercambiabile (it), interscambiabile Norwegian: Bokmål: utskiftbar Nynorsk: utskiftbar Portuguese: intercambiável m or f Romanian: interschimbabil (ro), interșanjabil (ro), substituibil (ro) Russian: взаимозаменя́емый (ru) (vzaimozamenjájemyj) Spanish: intercambiable (es) Ukrainian: взаємозамі́нний (vzajemozamínnyj)

alternating — see alternating

Noun

interchangeable (plural interchangeables)

1. Anything that can be interchanged; a substitute.

French

Etymology

From interchanger +‎ -able.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɛ̃.tɛʁ.ʃɑ̃.ʒabl/

Adjective

interchangeable (plural interchangeables)

1. interchangeable, substitutable

   Ces deux termes sont souvent interchangeables. ― These two terms are often interchangeable.

Derived terms

• interchangeablement

Further reading

• “interchangeable”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.